NJCU Launches Master’s Degree in Business Analytics and Data Science

On Feb 3, 2017

The NJCU School of Business at New Jersey City University has launched a Master of Science degree program in Business Analytics and Data Science designed to prepare students for careers in the burgeoning field of data analytics.

The Master of Science in Business Analytics and Data Science program will prepare students with the skills needed to gather, store, analyze and interpret large amounts of “Big Data” to facilitate informed business decision-making.

Data analytics is an area of strong employment growth. A recent study by McKinsey Global Institute projects about 500,000 jobs requiring data analysis skills by 2018, with a projected shortage of about 190,000 jobs. The NJCU School of Business program permits graduate students with an interest in analytics to focus their studies on techniques suitable to specific business disciplines such as finance, marketing, logistics and accounting.

“It’s clear that ‘Big Data’ is increasingly at the center of global business practices,” NJCU President Sue Henderson stated, adding, “Our Business Analytics and Data Science degree will prepare new graduates as well as seasoned professionals to become leaders in this vitally important emerging field.”

The program will be fully geared towards practice and can be completed within 16 months as part of a full-time cohort-based program, or over a two-year period on a part-time basis. Students will complete eight core data analytics courses and four electives culminating in a capstone project that applies their knowledge to a real world data science problem.

Among the NJCU faculty experts teaching in the area of business analytics and data science are top practicioners:

• J.D. Jayaraman, Associate Professor, Finance, who brings exceptional experience to the field of finance with his work as Global Business Manager of e-trading, models and analytics at Bloomberg, L.P. and Senior Vice President, Risk Management at Citigroup. Dr. Jayaraman received his Ph.D. in Finance from Oklahoma State University.

• Li Xu, Assistant Professor, Finance, has a unique interdisciplinary profile that spans Decision Science, Engineering, Finance, Computer Science and Mathematics. Dr. Xu comes to NJCU from State Street Bank in Boston, where he acquired extensive experience in “Big Data” analysis and business analytics. While there he constructed data-driven models to predict probability of default, loss given default, and operational risk. Dr. Xu received his Ph.D. in Management Science and Engineering with specialization in Finance from Stanford University

Dr. Bernard McSherry, founding dean of the NJCU School of Business, commented, “Our M.S. degree in Business Analytics and Data Science is an essential component of our core commitment to provide our students with access to leading experts in the cutting-edge technologies that are shaping the modern business landscape”.

The M.S. in Business Analytics and Data Science program will enroll its inaugural class for Fall 2017.

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